Drought — Oldham, Texas

2023-10-01 to 2023-10-31 · Oldham, Texas

Event narrative

The vast majority of Oldham County was in Moderate Drought (D1) through the month of September. An area of Severe Drought (D2) developed in the southwest corner of the county at the beginning of the of October and kept the D2 status all the way through the month. The entire county received 1 to 1.5 below normal precipitation for the month of October.

Wider weather episode

With rain shutting off mid June for much of the southern Texas Panhandle, this region was seeing major drought impacts by October, despite some record rainfall May through early June. Pumpkin yields were down almost 20-40% due to the dry and warm summer months continuing well into fall. Several grass fires have started around the area as well with a few of these fires becoming large and taking a good part of the day to put out. The main area suffering from drought remained across the I-40 corridor with areas just to the north and south of the interstate suffering the most from the lack of summer moisture, especially around Potter, Randall, Caron, and Armstrong Counties.

Source: NOAA Storm Events Database, event_id 1143329. Narrative written by the NWS forecast office that issued the report.